Friday, 3 March 2017

Tests Of Character

Been trying to pen something for a couple of days
now, to try to say something about our recent form, Karl Robinson’s outbursts
in the wake of the Shrewsbury game, and the coming weekend events. But none of
it came together, except that I kept coming back to one abiding thought: what’s
coming up will be a test of the character of all of the main players in our own
tragic-drama.

I don’t know whether or not a number of players
haven’t been pulling their weight. My suspicion is that morale can’t have been
helped by Robinson’s open dissatisfaction with the overall transfer window
moves and then, with each passing game in February that we didn’t win further
diminishing our outside chance of making the play-offs, everyone ended up
rather tired and irritable.

Equally I still don’t know whether Robinson will
prove to be the bright, engaging and successful manager with us that we all
hope he will be, or whether he really is all mouth and no trousers. I may not
like the fact that he talks gibberish but that’s irrelevant if he has the
players busting a gut for him and the results come through. For me he deserves
credit for talking to the Trust representatives, although we don’t know yet
whether he learnt anything, while we still need an answer to the question of
whether his financial interest in an agent’s company was a one-off. It does
matter given the Duchatelet vision that he supposedly bought into.

As far as footballing matters are concerned I’d
just draw a contrast between comments made by Kevin Nugent after he briefly took
over from Russell Slade. He said then that “the dirty work has been done” and
that “this is a great job to get now for someone”. Perhaps tellingly he added
that “I love coming in to the football club every single day; I really enjoy
working here ... the players we have in now, I enjoy working with them every
single day”. Fast forward and we have “too many people have been getting away
with things for too long and some of the players don’t deserve the Charlton
Athletic shirt” and that “I wish I could be honest and speak about how big some
of the problems are”. Then compare the results.

No matter, Robinson and the players have the
opportunity to show their character. I don’t want to hear any musings about
next season, comparisons with the situation that Sir Chris found himself in
towards the end of the 2010/11 season (and if you're going to do that might help if you get the position we ended the season in right). Fact is we are in danger of getting
relegated. Six points above the team fourth from bottom and a game in hand for
sure, but one in the bottom four, Port Vale, has played two or three games less
than the rest. If they were to win one of those, the real gap from the
relegation places becomes much too small for a team on a dire run to be
comfortable with. Sure, we have enough talent in the dressing room to stay up.
But as we have seen through the Duchatelet years – with the exception of the
second half of the first season, when the players that Powell brought in had
the character and ability to keep us up despite the regime’s idiotic decisions
- we perform less than the sum of our parts, for a number of reasons.

Getting relegated again is unthinkable for us but
in the wider football world there would be just an acknowledgement that far
stranger things have happened. We have the players and the manager that we
have, they’d better start showing they have what it takes and can get the best out of each other.

The other players in our set-up are of course the
fans and our owner. We know the former don’t lack character, it’s been shown in
the past and it’s being demonstrated again this weekend. I didn’t manage to
help in the clearing up of The Valley and now not going to Belgium will be the
second event I regret missing. Their actions and the commitment and love for
the club that they show are there for all to see.

What they are doing throws down a gauntlet to our
owner, a challenge for him to show his character. He could choose to be absent
and to say nothing, fuming in isolation about a ruined weekend and swearing not to be pushed around. He could choose to repeat previous insults and attempt once
more to label protesters something that they are not. Or he could, if he wanted
and had the character, rise to the occasion. The fans are going there to tell
you something, Mr Duchatelet, so listen to them, even meet them. If I was an expensive PR
person at the club it’s the advice I’d be giving. Of course, talking to them
would be tantamount to accepting that they are stakeholders and an essential
element in the success of the clubs that you own rather than customers, or representatives of an interesting social experiment.